April 24, 2024
Dr. David Dude, superintendent of the City Schools of Decatur, wrote a letter to his staff in July 2016 in which he stated, “As we head into the new school year I want to ensure we are all on the same page regarding equal educational opportunities for our students; especially as it relates to gender identity.
“To be clear, here are some examples of situations related to gender identity and how I expect them to be handled... For purpose of these examples, assume this student was assigned the sex of male at birth and now identifies himself as a female.
On September 14, 2017 parents spoke out against the school system’s policies regarding transgendered students. They declared, “These guidelines have serious implications for our students’ civil liberties and equal educational opportunities in competitive sports, our parental rights, and good governance.
“Many transgendered activists groups insist that transgendered students be treated in every respect as the gender they identify with, and not by their biological sex. We insist that there are areas in the education system where anatomical sex must be the sold distinctive trait considered."
The PubMed Health Glossary defines Psychosis as “a severe mental disorder in which a person loses the ability to recognize reality or relate to others. Symptoms include being paranoid, having false ideas about what is taking place or who one is, and seeing, hearing, or feeling things that are not there.”
Based on this definition it would appear that transgendered individuals are suffering from some kind of serious psychosis. Whether a transgendered person is psychotic, schizophrenic, or has a Dissociative Identity Disorder, he/she needs help. We should not be trying to normalize or facilitate their behavior, but provide love, compassion, and whatever counseling or therapy that is available.
Some have even called transgendered individuals dysfunctional. “Dysfunctional” is defined as "not performing normally, an abnormal or impaired functioning of a bodily system or organ.”
For example, neuronal injuries or various neurodegenerative diseases can create an autophagic dysfunction like Alzheimer’s disease, Huntington’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, and brain ischemia. It would be criminal to facilitate or enhance the progress of these diseases. Instead, we should do our best to seek a cure and at the very least attempt to minimize the consequences of these neurological dysfunctions.
If a marriage or a family is dysfunctional, that family needs counseling and sometimes intervention in order to halt the conflict, misbehavior, and sometimes child neglect or abuse in order to resolve the problems. It would be tragic to do anything that would exacerbate or aggravate the problems that have created the turmoil or improper behavior.
If an individual has psychological problems or dysfunctions like a bipolar disorder, post-traumatic syndrome, or a panic disorder it would be unseemly or patently indecorous to do anything to contribute to the mental and emotional pain that person is experiencing.
So, if someone is suffering from a gender identity problem or who has determined that he/she does not feel comfortable with his/her sexuality, why would be want to complicate matters for them by encouraging them to pursue a sexual identity contrary to the way God created them?
According to Stand to Reason, “Transgendered people feel like they are trapped inside a body that is the opposite of their perceived gender. As you can imagine, this leads to a tremendous amount of psychological and emotional distress. Many of them are stigmatized by society. Sadly, 41 percent of transgendered people attempt suicide (compared to 1.6 percent of the general population).
“They are deeply hurting inside. That is why many of them attempt to change their bodies with hormones, drugs, and sex change surgery. Instead of working to change their gender identity to match their biology, they want to change their biology to match their gender identity.”
However, once transgendered individuals go through all the necessary steps to align the appearance of their body with what is perceived to be their gender, they often want to detransition or return to their biological sex.
In fact, according to a FOX news report last year Caitlyn Jenner, formerly Bruce Jenner, was experiencing regret over transitioning from male to female and was considering a reversal of that decision. Jenner later denied any interest in detransitioning, but other sources indicated that Caitlyn hinted of “sex change regret.”
God created us male and female. If we abandon our biological sex can God’s purpose for our lives be fulfilled? Is God glorified through one attempting to change his/her sexual identity? Christianity Today asks these additional questions: “Is it morally permissible for a doctor to remove healthy organs? Is it acceptable to give puberty-delaying drugs to children who feel gender conflict? Is it ethical for society to require people to live as one gender if they identify strongly with the other?”
Although a growing percentage of Americans believe there is nothing morally wrong with someone wanting to change their God-given sexuality, it is difficult for me to concede it is God’s will or within the framework of biblical morality.
Russell D. Moore, president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, wrote, “All we can do is say what we believe as Christians: that all of us are sinners, and that none of us are freaks. We must conclude that all of us are called to repentance, and part of what repentance means is to receive the gender with which God created us, even when that’s difficult. We must affirm that God loves all persons, and that the gospel is good news for repentant prodigal sons and daughters, even for those who have trouble figuring out which is which."
The point is we do not do well when we attempt to facilitate someone’s perceived sexuality. When we do that, we not only enhance the pathway to their psychological and emotional distress, but succumb to the agenda of a secular world’s push for no moral absolutes.
We are becoming a nation of “individual moral menus.” There is no longer a common moral consensus. Most of us may well live to see the negative impact this will have on the family, on religious liberty, and on our society as a whole. May God help those who are trapped in a sexual identity crisis!
And may God help us all!
